Am I Right
Encyclopedia
AmIRight is a popular music
Web site created by Charles R. Grosvenor Jr. (born July 7, 1972, known as Chucky G). Visitors can view sections based on such topics as song parodies, misheard lyrics
(mondegreen
s), and album cover
parodies, and can submit their own without registering. The site was first launched March 23, 2000 and has since grown considerably.
AmIRight is a community based website, with all the content contained on the website created by visitors. New material is submitted online by individuals and reviewed by a group of "editors" who remove entries that don't conform to community standards regarding obscene content or spam.
Recently a sister site called Am I Wrong was opened which allows the users to create their own quiz.
s" to the site, stating what the lyrics they misheard were, and what the lyrics of the song actually are. As of October 11, 2007, there are a total of 101,716 misheard lyrics. There is a section where contributors admit their more embarrassing misheard lyric mishaps and the moment they came upon their mistakes. Another section associated with misheard lyrics includes "Misheard Lyrics in Film", where visitors recall moments where actors or actresses recall lyrics as misquoted by actors in either film or television from famous songs.
from an original artist's album, thanks to Amazon.com
's Music section.
s, or songs that have backwards messages recorded in them.
Hold Me Closer Tony Danza (and Other Misheard Lyrics) (October 28, 2007). Charles R. Grosvenor Jr, Sasquatch Books
, ISBN 1-57061-533-0 and Hit Me With Your Pet Shark (and Other Misheard Lyrics) (October 1, 2008). Charles R. Grosvenor Jr, Sasquatch Books
, ISBN 1-57061-576-4
Each book has several pages with information pulled from the various sections of the site including:
Popular music
Popular music belongs to any of a number of musical genres "having wide appeal" and is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. It stands in contrast to both art music and traditional music, which are typically disseminated academically or orally to smaller, local...
Web site created by Charles R. Grosvenor Jr. (born July 7, 1972, known as Chucky G). Visitors can view sections based on such topics as song parodies, misheard lyrics
Lyrics
Lyrics are a set of words that make up a song. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist or lyrist. The meaning of lyrics can either be explicit or implicit. Some lyrics are abstract, almost unintelligible, and, in such cases, their explication emphasizes form, articulation, meter, and symmetry of...
(mondegreen
Mondegreen
A mondegreen is the mishearing or misinterpretation of a phrase as a result of near homophony, in a way that gives it a new meaning. It most commonly is applied to a line in a poem or a lyric in a song...
s), and album cover
Album cover
An album cover is the front of the packaging of a commercially released audio recording product, or album. The term can refer to either the printed cardboard covers typically used to package sets of 10" and 12" 78 rpm records, single and sets of 12" LPs, sets of 45 rpm records , or the front-facing...
parodies, and can submit their own without registering. The site was first launched March 23, 2000 and has since grown considerably.
AmIRight is a community based website, with all the content contained on the website created by visitors. New material is submitted online by individuals and reviewed by a group of "editors" who remove entries that don't conform to community standards regarding obscene content or spam.
Recently a sister site called Am I Wrong was opened which allows the users to create their own quiz.
Misheard Lyrics
Since the website's inception, the site has offered the possibility for visitors to submit misheard lyrics, aka "mondegreenMondegreen
A mondegreen is the mishearing or misinterpretation of a phrase as a result of near homophony, in a way that gives it a new meaning. It most commonly is applied to a line in a poem or a lyric in a song...
s" to the site, stating what the lyrics they misheard were, and what the lyrics of the song actually are. As of October 11, 2007, there are a total of 101,716 misheard lyrics. There is a section where contributors admit their more embarrassing misheard lyric mishaps and the moment they came upon their mistakes. Another section associated with misheard lyrics includes "Misheard Lyrics in Film", where visitors recall moments where actors or actresses recall lyrics as misquoted by actors in either film or television from famous songs.
Song Parodies
The most dedicated core of site members has submitted several hundred song parodies each to the site. Some have contributed over a thousand, with the most prolific authors contributing over two thousand. As of May 2009, there were over 60,000 song parodies. The song parody section of the website also includes parodies of album covers and former competitions for "[Parody] Song of the Month". Individual parodies can be ranked by viewers on a scale of 1 (being the worst) to 5 (being the best) in three categories: How Funny, Pacing, and Overall Score.Comedy Recordings
The recordings section is for recorded performances of parodies or other musical comedy pieces. AmIRight doesn't host the files, so the section is more of an index to other sites that contain recordings. All entries in this section are submitted to the site by the original authors.Album Cover Parodies
A recent addition to the site, the Album Cover parody section lets people humorously mutilate or otherwise modify an album coverAlbum cover
An album cover is the front of the packaging of a commercially released audio recording product, or album. The term can refer to either the printed cardboard covers typically used to package sets of 10" and 12" 78 rpm records, single and sets of 12" LPs, sets of 45 rpm records , or the front-facing...
from an original artist's album, thanks to Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
's Music section.
Music Trivia
This section is focused on strange and funny facts about various songs and performers. Most pages consist of songs of performers that have certain commonalities in common such as songs that have been banned, performers that have criminal recordCriminal record
A criminal record is a record of a person's criminal history, generally used by potential employers, lenders etc. to assess his or her trustworthiness. The information included in a criminal record varies between countries and even between jurisdictions within a country...
s, or songs that have backwards messages recorded in them.
Names
This section deals with band name origins, pseudonyms, names of the offspring of famous musicians, song and band name parodies, user-created band names, inventive portmanteaux of individual band or performer names, inappropriate commercial soundtrack selections, proposed duets, inappropriate songs to play while on hold, adding, removing, or changing letters from titles to create new titles, lyrics that are literally impossible, and the use of song titles as questions and answers.Real Lyrics
A section is accessible concerning "real lyrics", that is, those lyrics which fit certain categories, such as those which are "Misrhymed", "Insincere", "Dirty", and other categories.Publications
Two books which each gather over 500 misheard lyrics submitted to the site have been published.Hold Me Closer Tony Danza (and Other Misheard Lyrics) (October 28, 2007). Charles R. Grosvenor Jr, Sasquatch Books
Sasquatch Books
Sasquatch Books is a Seattle-based book publishing company that was founded in 1986. Its books are about the western United States and Canada and cover topics such as nature, travel, gardening, entertainment, and food & wine....
, ISBN 1-57061-533-0 and Hit Me With Your Pet Shark (and Other Misheard Lyrics) (October 1, 2008). Charles R. Grosvenor Jr, Sasquatch Books
Sasquatch Books
Sasquatch Books is a Seattle-based book publishing company that was founded in 1986. Its books are about the western United States and Canada and cover topics such as nature, travel, gardening, entertainment, and food & wine....
, ISBN 1-57061-576-4
Each book has several pages with information pulled from the various sections of the site including:
- Add a Letter to a Song Title
- Change a Letter in a Song Title
- Remove a Letter in a Song Title
- What if Groups Merged
- Song Mash Ups
- Songs to Respond to Other Songs
- Bad Choices For On-Hold Music
Publicity and Acclaim
Amiright has been mentioned in various articles and other publications over the years.- In May 2005, Spin Magazine voted Amiright as one of "Four Amazing Rock Websites", noting, "This compedium of thousands of song parodies even features spoofsParodyA parody , in current usage, is an imitative work created to mock, comment on, or trivialise an original work, its subject, author, style, or some other target, by means of humorous, satiric or ironic imitation...
of "Weird Al" Yankovic"Weird Al" YankovicAlfred Matthew "Weird Al" Yankovic is an American singer-songwriter, music producer, accordionist, actor, comedian, writer, satirist, and parodist. Yankovic is known for his humorous songs that make light of popular culture and that often parody specific songs by contemporary musical acts...
. How positively metaMetaMeta- , is a prefix used in English to indicate a concept which is an abstraction from another concept, used to complete or add to the latter....
." - On October 25, 2005, Askmen.comAskMen.comAskMen.com is a free online men’s web portal, with international versions in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia.-History:...
proclaimed Amiright one of the "Best & Coolest Sites Around." Amiright received a rating of 7/10, saying, "This site has tons of music-related information like misheard lyrics, cool band names, etc. The song parodies are hilarious -- if you like Weird Al, you'll appreciate these." - Amiright was mentioned in the Chicago TribuneChicago TribuneThe Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
as one of the 50 Best Web Sites in the Arts and Culture. The Tribune described Amiright as "really funny." - On September 24, 2006, the EZHelp radio show interviewed Chucky G about AmiRight and its sister web sites. The show claims that AmiRight has been featured in such publications as "USA TodayUSA TodayUSA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
, New York PressNew York PressNew York Press was a free alternative weekly in New York City, that was published from 1988 to 2011. During its lifetime, it was the main competitor to the Village Voice...
, Entertainment WeeklyEntertainment WeeklyEntertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
, and US News Magazine to name a few."